Krag problem, need help!!

[38wcf]

I've got a '98 Krag rifle that is uncut and in great shape. It is a terrific shooter with Lyman 311413 bullets except that after about 10-12 rounds the p.o.i. jumps about 2ft high at 500 yds. That cost me a match last Saturday.
Anybody have any ideas about how to cure this problem. I'd be grateful for any advice.

[Willbird]

I do know from reading that the Krag with it's one locking lug was known for shooting high with wet ctg.

If that can help you find something your welcome to it.

My Krag has a no gunsmith williams rear peep sight on it, I need to shoot it more :-)

Bill

[waksupi]

Check for a bedding problem. That seems like a pretty extreme jump.

[Bob S]

I'd like to know what you're using for a load with that bullet that will stay on the paper at 500 yards. I've not had much success with that mould.

Resp'y,
Bob S.

[Buckshot]

...........I would also suspect a bedding issue. You have a long slender barrel out there with a stock going almost to the muzzle and an upper handguard. A freind had a factory sporter that would suddenly change POI horizontally after enough rounds had been fired to warm the barrel. At the forend tip where the router had run there was a small little ridge just to one side a bit off center. WHen the bbl warmed it'd flop over ot the other side.

When he took the stock off he said you could see the shiney spot the barrel made on the ridge. I had a M38 Turk with a forend that was warped a bit to the left and also twisted. Take out the barreled action and as the barrel cleared, the forend would almost pop. I have a 1895 Steyr and the wings on the rear of the rear sight, which retained the back end of the handguard. The handguard was tall enough so as to keep the front of the action from being snugged down into it's inletting.

As a consequence if free of it's barrel bands the barrel would be up off the forend tip maybe 1/4" or so. Fitting the front band would bend the barrel down. It was no more work then to take an X-Acto knife and slice off thin slivers of wood from under those rear sight arms until the action bedded solidly to turn it into a much better shooter.

Something as you describe really seems to point to bedding, or something somewhere binding.

.............Buckshot

[38wcf]

Bob S.
I am using the 311413 bullet cast from WW's and sized to .311 loaded with 21 gr of IMR 4198.
My rifle has the 1901 sight (which I think is the best of the Krag sights). I have also had pretty good results with Lyman 311291 and the same load. But the 413 does best. Our 500 yd target is a 36" square piece of 3/8" plate with a 9" bullseye. With this rifle & load, I can keep them all on the plate and get a few bullseyes. At least, I can until it heats up and p.o.i. jumps above the target.

Buckshot & others, thanks for the advice about bedding. That was my 1st thought, too. Anybody have any thoughts as to whether it should be free floating or glass bedded all the way??
thanks again.
Phil in Kansas

[Bob S]

Phil:

Thanks, I will have to try that one. Do you use dacron or other filler material with your 4198 loads?

I also have the M1901 sight on my as-issued '98. I like that one because my O'Hare micrometer works on it. It actually came with the M1902 sight and handguard when I bought it. I also have a Redfield M70KT receiver sight that mounts on the left side with a long sideplate screw and a bracket in the cut-off hole, no permanent alteration to the rifle except the cut-off is supposed to be removed. Buckshot has a pic of his rifle with a similar sight that somehow he (or the previous owner) was able to mount with the cutoff still in place.

Is your "rifle" as-issued, and is it an infantry rifle (30" barrel) or carbine length? If it is as issued, I would recommend not doing any modifications to it, other than providing some clearance for thermal expansion as described below.

As for bedding, you can't free-float a Krag barrel unless the action has been modified for a third bedding screw at the front end of the receiver or into the bolster of the barrel. With only the two "stock" aft screws holding the barreled action down, the bending moment on an unrestrained barrel will eventually break something. The barrel needs to be restrained from excess vertical motion somehow. For a 30" barrel in the as-issued stock, the best technique I have found is to loosen the middle band screw a bit so it is not "clamping" the barrel tightly; also check to see that there is some small amount of upward movement possible at the upper band. If you push up on the barrel here with your thumb, you would like to see a few thousandths of movement, but not much more than that. That's enough to assure that the barrel is not clamped tightly at this point, and gives it enough room to expand forward as it heats. Keeping the clearance and movement to a minimum, though, hepls assure that the barrel cannot "jump" far enough in recoil to overstress the bedding screws.

For "carbine" configuration, I have used a pad of cork gasket matrerial in the barrel seat of the stock at the forend. The barrel should not contact the stock anyplace else, just at the cork pad. Same deal with the barrel band here: there needs to be a minimum of clearance between it and the barrel so the barrel can expand forward as it heats, but not so much that the barrel can "jump" more than a few thousandths in recoil. The cork material helps dampen vibrations.

Resp'y,
Bob S.

[Mel-4857]

Bob,
Sounds very similar to what can happen with the No.4 Lee Enfield. It has a skinny barrel that doesn't take much pressure to change the POI. Any used up here for target shooting ,are free floated from the chamber to the end of the barrel. Most like a little up pressure about half way down the barrel, just a few pounds. My favorite gunsmith uses this technique on his own guns. Mel

[Bret4207]

Best thing to do is ship it to me right away before it starts infecting your other guns! I haven't seen an affordable Krag, sporterized or original, in years.

[38wcf]

Bob, My Krag is a full length '98 rifle made in 1901. Unaltered.
Not familiar with the O'Hare micrometer. But I recently bought a 1903 sight mic from Ray-Vin, thinking that it would probably work for the Krag due to the similarity with the '03 sight. Only thing I had to change was to make a modification to the width between the feet of the elevator, the '03 being wider than the Krag. When I told Ray about it, he asked for the dimensions of the Krag sight, made some elevators to fit it and sent me one. If anybody needs one, contact him at Ray-Vin.com and tell him you want one for the Krag. It sure takes the guesswork out of the elevation adjustments once you get the mic settings recorded.
I will try loosening the band screws. Hopefully, that will take care of it.
Thanks for the help.
TPR BRET- I am keeping it separate from my other guns so it won't infect them so I probably won't be shipping it to you. But thanks for the offer, anyway.
I bought this rifle at a farm auction here in east KS. Had to go to $450 for it.
The previous owner was a shootin' buddy of my Dad's and they both bought their Krags for $2.50 from the DCM way back when. My Dad had his cut but this one was left original and had been standing in the corner of the farmhouse, probably since before I was born, judging by the dust & grime that was on it. And that was a long time ago!!

[38wcf]

Bob, got carried away and forgot to answer about fillers, etc.
No, I have never used any dacron, toilet paper or any kind of filler. I do try to remember to tip the rifle up almost vertical before firing, tho. According to the chrono, it makes an appreciable difference in velocity.

[Bob S]

Phil:

Tipping the muzzle up with a cartridge in the chamber is forbidden at most ranges around here, so that's a non-starter for me. I may try the 4198 loads with and without dacron and see how it compares to 2400.

The Ray-Vin micrometer is a reproduction of the O'Hare. I have one of Ray's first-made, but I also have had a real O'Hare for 30 years, and I can get it to work on the Krage sight with a little finesse. A purpose-built one for the Krag sounds like a good idea, I will have to contact Ray. Thanks for the heads up!

Resp'y,
Bob S.

[38wcf]

Bob,
Well, I hadn't thought about not being allowed to tip the rifle up, being out here in the sticks. But I can sure see how it wouldn't work in most places. And I probably won't be doing it anymore, either.
If you use any dacron, I sure would like to know the results. I would like to work up a good load using 5744 powder but haven't found the time. And, my wife got a new Marlin 32 H&R yesterday for Cowboy Shooting so that'll keep me busy loading for her until the new wears off.
Ray told me that he made up several of the modified elevator "feet" to fit the Krag sight. So he ought to sell you just that part.
Shoot straight. Pard!

[BruceB]

Krag NRA 24" carbine, issue open sights and 62-year-old eyes....

Lee 135-grain boolit, water-dropped WW .309", 26.0 XMP5744, CC! 250, dacron, av 2009, ES 52, 4"/5 rounds /100 yards.

Lyman 152-grain 311466, 2.876" oal, water-dropped WW, .311", 24.0 IMR4198, CCI 200, dacron, av 1874 fps, 60 ES, 7/8"/10 rounds/50 yards.

Same 311466, 20.0 5744, CCI 200, dacron, 1560 av, ES 43, 3/4"/10 rounds/50 yards.

In my ammunition, dacron is no longer an option in most cast rifle loads, because I use it in everything that leaves more than perhaps 25% airspace in the case. There are occasional combinations where it does nothing to improve the results, but overall the returns from its use are so positive that it's become a no-brainer for me. I find that where I used to load most trial loads with/without dacron for direct comparison, as recently as a few months back, I now just don't worry about it much, which saves me a lot of time and components. If it WON'T shoot with dacron, I'll move on and find something that WILL!

Note that I use a LOOSE tuft of dacron, eyeballed to approximate the empty space over the charge or slightly larger. It is not compressed or tamped in any way. I push the tuft into the case with a flat-bit screwdriver until I can just feel the powder, which usually leaves a bit of dacron hanging out of the neck. That bit is tucked JUST into the mouth, and seating the bullet finishes the dacron installation. This method has given me zero difficulty or problems over many, many thousands of rounds to date, from 6.5x54 M-S to .50-2.5 Sharps.

I'm a fan, I guess.

[Char-Gar]

IF this POI shift is repeatable and predictable after 10-12 rns, I would be farily certain the problem is triiggered by barrel heat. As barrels heat up they start to change shape and even lengthen a mite. Barrel that has been straightened will want to go back to it's original shape and many other such things. The bedding needs to be relieaved to allow the barrel to heat and do it's thing without binding or bending.

I would doubt if you have an ammo problem.

[Buckshot]

.............Barrel expansion lengthwise can be a real eye opener. Take a piece of 1/2" steel maybe 6" long and chuck it in a lathe. One end in the chuck, t'other with a dead center. Take a cut of a few thousands and before you're half way the bit will be hogging some and the finish will be bad.

That bit of warmth from cutting doesn't mean a whole bunch to the 1/2" piece's OD, but it's length is 12 times that and it's trapped, so it bows. A rifle barrel won't be trapped like that piece of steel in the lathe, but touching somewhere, or a bit of a bind (rear sight/handguard/barrel bands) and all it takes is a few thousandths here, to make a big difference out there.

..............Buckshot